Alternate pitch benefits Jays' Frasor

[LittleOzzy]

Jason Frasor had one thing on his mind after working ahead in the count against Cleveland's Victor Martinez during the ninth inning on Saturday afternoon. The Blue Jays reliever wanted to end the game with a strikeout.

"Once I got strike two, I was thinking that," Frasor said. "It was nothing but strikeout pitches after that. We were going for it."

Frasor used a pair of sliders to create the first two strikes, but the right-hander knew he had reached an opportune time to show off a pitch he tried to perfect over the offseason. Frasor came set, and unleashed his unique split-finger fastball, which dove down at Martinez's shins while the catcher swung and missed to seal a 5-4 win for Toronto.

"That was a pretty big pitch," Blue Jays manager Cito Gaston marveled.

It's an offering that Frasor has used off and on since the 2005 season, when Blue Jays bullpen coach Bruce Walton -- often referred to as "Pappy" by the team's pitchers -- first introduced it to the pitcher. This offseason, Frasor decided to practice featuring the splitter again, adding another out pitch to help offset his fastball and slider.

http://toronto.bluejays.mlb.com/news/ar ... p&c_id=tor

[youngLion]

I didn't see the game, how did the pitch look? It must unique as the article says, because Wilner thought that it was a change.

[s e n s i]

It dove like change, and that's what I thought it was. I think it was 87 on the gun, so yeah guess it was a splitter. A nice pitch. Hopefully he can master it so he doesn't have to resort to his change up (which is okay) a lot for his SO pitch.

[BasketballAbyss]

I thought it was a change too, but now that I think of it, it was around 87-88 mph and dove pretty well. The speed is a little too high to be a change, unless of course we're talking about an A.J. Burnett or Eric Gagne type of changeup haha.

Here's hoping Frasor continues his great pitching the rest of the year.

[evilRyu]

yeah that pitch was sick... really had the batter fooled too.

[youngLion]

I thought it was a change too, but now that I think of it, it was around 87-88 mph and dove pretty well. The speed is a little too high to be a change, unless of course we're talking about an A.J. Burnett or Eric Gagne type of changeup haha.

Here's hoping Frasor continues his great pitching the rest of the year.

Haha it'd be nice to have a pitcher like that on staff. I remember back in his heyday Jason Schmidt's change used to touch [i]ninety[/] on the gun. Just filthy.